Pluche, N.-A., Le Spectacle de la nature, Paris: Frères Estienne [Liège: Bassompierre], 1771, t. 8, Seconde partie
This is one of the volumes of Le Spectacle de la nature by the abbé Noël-Antoine Pluche, counterfeited by Jean-François Bassompierre in Liège with the false address 'A Paris, Chez les Frères Estienne, rue S. Jacques, à la Vertu '. The vignette on the title-page is used by Bassompierre in J. Harroy, Traité de géométrie pratique, Liège, Bassompierre, 1745,
L.-A. Caraccioli, Lettres récréatives et morales sur les mœurs du temps, Paris et Liège, Bassompierre, 1767, t. II, titre, etc. The engraved headpiece p. 1 appears in Bassompierre’s official ed. of the Actions chrétiennes by Simon de la Vierge Liège, Bassompierre et Delorme de La Tour, 1745, t. III, p. xiii. The frontispiece is signed 'de Boubers ', the name of several members of a family active in the field of printing in Liège at that time. This practice of counterfeiting, and the commercial device used by Bassompierre for selling it to the detriment of the Estienne were denounced by Diderot in the Lettre sur la liberté de la presse (see D. Droixhe, 'Signatures clandestines et autres essais sur les contrefaçons de Liège et de Maastricht au 18e siècle', Studies on Voltaire and the Eighteenth Century 2001:10, Oxford : Voltaire Foundation, 2001, p. 49-198, ill. 01 020, 01 021 ; D. Droixhe, Une histoire des Lumières au pays de Liège. Livre, idées, société, Éd. de l’Université de Liège, 2007, p. 111-112.It is noticeable that this counterfeit ed. imitates the practices of the Parisian printers (catchwords, signatures, etc.) and reproduces the Parisian ‘Approbation’ delivered on June 14 1749 by Millet, probably to accredit the edition. Rev. D. Adams, D. Droixhe & A. Piette.